Alastair MacGibbon (ON 1985) Australia’s first Children’s eSafety Commissioner

Our current pervasive social media environment, as many parents are well aware, has a darker side.  Alastair MacGibbon’s recent appointment as the Children’s eSafety Commissioner is responsible for leading online safety education for Australian children and young people, protecting them when they experience serious cyberbullying and managing complaints about offensive or illegal online content. Alastair will be empowered to slap big social media companies with fines of up to $17,000 a day if they fail to remove cyber-bullying material targeted at children.

Prior to his appointment as Commissioner, Alastair spent time in both public and private sector online leadership roles. Alastair was previously General Manager Security at Dimension Data, a Director of the Centre for Internet Safety at the University of Canberra, as well as CEO of CREST Australia, a not-for-profit that certifies ‘white hat’ ethical hackers.

For almost five years, Alastair headed up Trust & Safety at eBay ANZ and later eBay Asia-Pacific. He also worked as a Federal Agent with the Australian Federal Police for 15 years, and was the founding Director of the Australian High Tech Crime Centre.